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Rh the boiling down of the rules for employes printed on the card of instructions."

"That so?"

"Yes, sir, Promptness, Industry, Neatness. I'm trying to fill that bill."

"You've done it so far," observed old Jack. "I hear you show up an hour before time."

"Can't sleep, thinking of my grand luck!" chuckled Slavin.

"You're certainly all the time fussing around, if that's industry," went on Knight. "Those windows shine like headlights. You've oiled up everything till the lack of creaking makes a fellow lonesome. As to neatness—well, if you haven't actually scrubbed the floor here!"

"I thought it needed it," said Slavin.

"Keep it up, son," encouraged old Jack. "You're making a fine beginning."

Slavin went singing and whistling about his work the whole day long. It did Ralph's heart good, when he arrived, to see his protégé happy, industrious, and headed in the right direction.

Things were going on famously smooth and satisfactory at the switch tower. A friend of old Farrington's, and by no means of Ralph's, one Bardon, an inspector, had looked over the layout with a critical eye the day previous.